What is the source for the devotions? Is it developed by WEC or another source. (No one in our office is aware of the source. )

Thanks,
Steve
FFE

Hi Steve,

The WEC Devotional Journal does not come with any content when you install the extension. If you are reading the documentation for the extension or looking at online examples, it features content from the Ginghamsburg Church Transformation Journal (TJ) which is at the www.ginghamsburg.org/tj website. Ginghamsburg Church developed and owns the TJ content. If you are looking at another site -- it is being used in dozens of placces so far -- then the site owner/church/ministry likely developed that content.

-Dave

Has anyone linked the RSS devotion feed from Upper Room into the Devo Ext?

Rev. Michael

Michael,

We have talked about doing this, but we would need their permission of course, but we could try to get permission. Also, I did a quick look and I see an e-mail version of Upeer Room but not the RSS feed. Please post a link to where you found reference to an RSS feed.

I have a question to you and others. If we went to the effort to automatically populate the Devotional Journal extension with the Upper Room devotional, would you use it?

In Christ,
Mark

I think it would be nice to have as an option for the weeks I didn't have the time to write my own devotional

Mark,

Glad to see you're "back" at it. Back injuries...boy those are the pits!

I would use an Upper Room extension for the following reasons:
1. My church subscribes to the print devotional...it's free for everyone. I don't know how long they've been doing it, but they love it.
2. As the only staff member of a small church, I'm doing well to write thoughtful sermons, blogs, and keep up with web admin. I'd love a syndication of a reasonably reliable source. (Yes, I am picky about devotional/theological content.)

I found the Upper Room syndication on http://www.umcom.org/devotional/ ...I think you'd have to be logged in to get to the correct page.

Rev. Michael

Dave,

That would be a little harder because the software would need to know which records to write to. But I guess we could just add to new ones and not overwrite existing ones. But, we will consider this need.

In Him,
Mark

Rev. Michael,

I took a quick look at this and it looks like they provide some Javascript that you can put on your website that will create a little banner with links back to the Upper Room website. Unfortunately, except for a the first little bit of text, the content of the devotional does not appear on your website. Instead it links back to the Upper Room site to get the full text. Also, it seems to just want to display the current day only, although there may be a parameter that can tell it to provide previous and future days.

So, giving it a quick look, it appears that the Upper Room is not generally allowing people to put their copyrighted content on a website except for this banner. So, if we wanted to include their devotional content inside the WEC Devotional Journal then it would require special permission and probably a little more support on their side beyond this Javascript. We will see if we can talk to them about this.

In Him,
Mark

Mark,

I know the Dev Team has a lot on its collective plate. It's just a thought.

/jmt

Michael,

I appreciate your concern. We are really busy. At the same time, we love sugestions. We just want to do what will web empower churches. So we look to those of you who are in churches using our tools to help us make WEC better. Also, in this case, we have had a few people mention incorporating the Upper Room into the WEC Devotional Journal. So, we will at least check it out.

We are blessed to partner with you in ministry.

In Christ,
Mark